Seven dollars -- it's enough to buy a child's ticket for a SeaWolves game or to drive away well-fed from your favorite fast-food place.

And $7 is how much you'll save today -- compared with this same date in 2012 -- when you fill your car with 15 gallons of gasoline.

Signs all over Erie on Tuesday showed gas selling for as little as $3.299. Mix in a few higher-priced sites and the local average is $3.31, substantially less than the state average of $3.48, according to the latest AAA Fuel Gauge report.

Not only have gasoline prices been falling, but they've been falling quickly, said Bevi Powell, a spokeswoman for AAA.

Today's price is down from $3.42 a week ago, $3.60 a month ago and $3.78 a year ago.

Add it all up and the savings are substantial.

At the current price, a motorist who drives 12,000 miles a year in a car that gets 20 mpg would stand to save $288 a year.

The amount of money you stand to save on a summer vacation is obviously less significant. Travel 1,400 miles to the Outer Banks of North Carolina and back and you'll pocket a savings of $33.60 from gas prices in May 2012.

Falling prices come at a good time for most motorists, many of whom travel more during warmer weather, Powell said.

"I do see it as a positive," said John Oliver, president of VisitErie, Erie County's tourism promotion agency. "Any time you see the price of gas go down, it certainly encourages more people to consider vacationing and visiting another destination."

Chris Scott, an owner of Erie-based Scott Enterprises Inc., which owns numerous hotels, restaurants and Splash Lagoon Indoor Water Park, said the water park, which draws primarily from within a two-hour radius, holds its own even when gas prices are high and times are tough.

But for a business built on tourism, there are advantages to cheaper gas.

Scott said tourists are more likely to travel and have more money to spend on other things.

"All the things we offer are luxury, discretionary items," he said. "Lower gas prices have a psychological effect."

And for businesses, those prices have an effect on the bottom line.

Scott said, "The other problem with higher gas prices is that the companies that deliver our food mark on a surcharge. But we don't change our menu and our prices at Applebees."

Predicting gas prices is a notoriously low-percentage endeavor. Just last summer, pundits were forecasting that prices were likely to fall below the $3 mark before winter.

That never happened.

But there are reasons to be optimistic that gas prices will hold steady or continue to decline.

"What we are seeing is that there is lower oil costs this summer," AAA's Powell said. "There is ample refinery capacity and there continues to be weak demand."

There was more good news Tuesday for those concerned about the cost of gasoline.

The price of oil fell 43 cents to $95.73 a barrel on expectations of another hike in U.S. oil supplies, said an Associated Press report.

And in a look at the longer trend, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said last week in its annual energy outlook that strong growth in domestic crude production is likely to reduce U.S. reliance on imported oil.

For now, local motorists enjoy an unusual distinction.

Of the 22 Pennsylvania communities surveyed by AAA, gas prices in Erie are the lowest.